


The Sea Calls to Us

by Skiera21



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Pirate, Angst, Choking, Dominant Kylo Ren, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Loss of Virginity, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Physical Abuse, Pirate!Kylo Ren, Possessive Kylo Ren, Reader-Insert, Slow Burn, Soft Kylo Ren, Swordfighting, Underage Drinking, you are kind of with hux but not really
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-06
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:01:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25108162
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skiera21/pseuds/Skiera21
Summary: All you have ever wanted was to set sail and be your own person, but being the Governor's daughter holds you back. Your island is raided by the infamous Pirate Captain, Kylo Ren, and you are taken aboard his ship, The Finalizer, and used as bait against the First Order Trading Company. Though opening old wounds and being reminded of people from your past may cause you to turn your back on the life that has been built for you.
Relationships: Armitage Hux/Reader, Ben Solo | Kylo Ren & You, Ben Solo | Kylo Ren/Reader, Ben Solo/Reader, Ben Solo/You, Kylo Ren/Reader, Kylo Ren/You
Comments: 7
Kudos: 37





	1. Salt and Gold

**Author's Note:**

> Hello All ! This is my first fic on AO3 and my first Kylo Ren/ Reader fic too!  
> This story starts by following you through the first couple of years so its going to be a bit of a slow burn, but there should hopefully be little bits of smut to keep you going!  
> There is a lot of similar items from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies as they help with imagery but keeping it very much Star Wars based.  
> I would love to receive some constructive criticism on my story as I am still pretty new to writing it all down instead of just keeping it in my head haha!

You were always fascinated by the sea, even as a young child growing up in Portsmouth in England, any excuse to surround yourself by the boats and those who would sail them. You would beg the sailors down at the harbour to teach you how to read maps and the old songs that they would sing on their travels. When you looked out at the vast ocean you felt calm, all your troubles being taken away with the tide. Always dreaming that one day, an adventure would take you out and let you sail across the ocean.

You were lucky enough that a few weeks after your fourteenth name day, your father came to you and your sister as the newly appointed Governor, who was instructed to support the First Order Trading Company by colonising an island off of North America in the region they called the Caribbean.

You were excited to leave, unlike your sister who grew accustom to the lavish lifestyle that came with the upper-class title. She was what you would call a proper lady of society, always polite and well-mannered, the epitome of a Governor’s daughter. You on the other hand would be what your father would call as wild, unfit to be wed and needed a matronly figure in her life, in order to excel in the future.

You called bullshit on that.

The day your father delivered the news of your travels you rushed to your room to pack, even though the date of your departure was weeks away. You spent as much free time as you could with the old sailors, gaining as much knowledge as you could about ships and the sea. Learning tales of their adventures and ghost stories of pirates who would raid those who dared cross them. 

Two months out to sea you felt as free as you had ever felt, despite your daily etiquette classes delivered by your hired matron. During the day, you would learn how to be a “proper lady", to learn manners and to be mild tempered, as well as appropriate hobbies such as embroidery and florigraphy (the language of what each flower meant). But during your evening time you would learn how to work the ship, under the disguise of a young crewman.

During the day you could feel yourself getting tense and frustrated with the teachings that the matron provided, as you knew you would never benefit from them. Often getting angry and leaving your classes to go to the stern of the ship, to look at nothing but the ocean and taking in the vastness of it, letting your mind calm down with the waves created by the ship itself. You were reprimanded for your rudeness, normally with cane to your hands, being told that ladies should excuse themselves if they are feeling unwell.

Again, you though this was bullshit.

You knew you were different than the girls you grew up with in etiquette classes, working with your hands and solving problems was what came naturally to you. You knew you were not placed on this earth to support a man in his triumphs, you were here to rule something. Owning your own ship or some corner of this earth that you could call yours.

You thrived in the evenings; you knew that most of the crew knew who you were. Unlike the officers, who rarely paid attention to you unless instructed, the men could clearly recognise who you were, despite the oversized brimmed cap, linen undershirt, riding trousers and cavaliers. And when alone they would treat you with kindness and respect, they probably assumed that the Governor would toss them overboard if they dared disagree with you. Not that the Governor knew what it was exactly you were doing in the evenings, he most likely thought you were reading like your sister and learning to be a lady and getting ready for when you would turn eighteen to be married.

Learning about the ship was fascinating, how the wind controlled the speed and knowing how to use it to your advantage was enthralling. Knowing when to tie knots to keep the sails in certain positions, or to rush to change suddenly in case of a change. The meticulous upkeep of the ship so that it would always perform as expected. It was a science, knowing that one wrong move could possibly devastate the entire crew and send you into the depths below.

You liked to take time in your day to look out at the bow of the ship, to experience seeing nothing but the waves before you. It made you feel as if you were guiding the ship, like the siren that was carved into the front. There was power in it, making you feel like you were telling the crew where to go.

You had heard from the crew the night before that you were expected to arrive in the new port in about a week, too soon in your eyes but you knew this is what you came for. Heading for an island called Chandrila, you were told that it was small but held opportunity to be developed. Whatever that meant.

As evening approached, you were about to get ready to change into your ‘work’ attire but as you looked upon the ocean one last time before turning to leave, you could see in the distance nothing but a thick fog, like smoke from your fireplace, hearing nothing but an eerie quietness. As the ship breached the fog, hairs stood up on your arms, you backed away slightly sensing danger, until a figure on some scrap wood came into your vision.

“Look! There is someone in the water” shouting as loud as you could to get the attention of all the crew.

“Man overboard! Drop the lifeboat!” you heard in the distance, knowing that a few people would be going to collect the stranded body you saw.

Your father came up behind you, placing his hand on in-between your shoulder blades, trying to guide you away from the front of the boat.

“Y/N, please tend to the boy, make sure he is well. If he makes it he can come with us to Chandrila and train under the Blacksmith, Mr Jacobs has been hounding at me demanding an apprentice” you nodded at your fathers request, in some way you felt responsible for the person on the makeshift raft, you knew they would have been spotted eventually but because you had done so, it was your responsibility. You rushed to where the lifeboat would be raised, waiting until it breached the deck, you were shaking, not knowing who or what to expect.

“Colonel Hux, what should we do with the boy?” you heard your father talk to the red head a few paces in front of you. He seemed to be young, no older than twenty, which given his position you knew that this man had power in some way or another, not many people got to Colonel at his age.

“Bring him in, he may have information on what has happened here. Use your girls to get that information, if they can’t, my men will question him" the coldness of his tone seeped through to your bones, and you knew by the way he said “question him" he meant torture. You were confused however to what the Colonel meant by saying ‘what happened here’, you were too focused on the boy that was being lowered onto the deck. You took in your surroundings and gasped at the sight. 

What you thought was fog in the distance was clearly smoke, it was scratching at your lungs, making your eyes water at the thickness of it. You fought it to go to the edge of the ship, to look at the terrifying site before you. There was a graveyard of ships, you couldn’t tell how many because they were blown to pieces, items of furniture, wood and debris floating in the water. You turned your back on the scene, not being able to take in the burn of the smoke in your lungs any further. You headed towards the unconscious boy, your sister already by his side. Two men carried him towards your chambers on the second deck.

“He can stay in my room until he wakes,” you said aloud, your voice raspier than normal, “I will clean him up and make sure that he is okay".

You essentially banished the two crew mates from your bedroom, after they placed the unknown boy on your bed.

“Y/N, I do not feel comfortable letting this boy in your bed-"

“Until he is awake, where else should he go?” you cut off your father, he insisted you care for the boy, if he had to have your bed, then so be it.

“If he needs to sleep longer then I will just sleep in Elizabeth’s room, then he can have arrangements to sleep below deck” you rolled your eyes at your father, he clearly thought you two would get up to something inappropriate, and you were too busy trying to save this boy’s life to even look at him properly.

“Y/N...” your father warned, eyeing you cautiously, “what if he is a pirate?”

“Father, you have put me in charge of his care, please trust me to do so"

Your father hesitated for a few moments before he let out a long sigh and headed towards the door to leave the bedroom. After he left you turned to your sister.

“Elizabeth, fuck off”

“What? Why? “

“Because I’m the oldest and I said so"

“I’m telling father you said a bad word!”

“Try getting that bad word out of your mouth to tell him what I said"

“I’m telling Matron, and then you will have the cane again! Why can’t I stay? He is very handsome; he may be the prince who Matron told me that I will marry"

“Fuck. Off. Elizabeth. I found him so I’ll look after him" you glared at your sister, she was 3 years younger than you and was spooked by anything, so you giving her a hard stare had her retiring to her room before you could add to your argument.

You waited until she left, with a metaphorical tail between her legs, before you looked at the boy placed on your bed. You couldn’t be sure of his age because of how tall he was, as he was nearly taking up the entire length of your bed. Your eyes drifted to his face, which was speckled in beauty marks, some darker than others but it gave the illusion of stars scattered upon him. You moved closer to him now, eyeing his hair and how dark it was, like a cloudless night, waves going through it as if it was brushed back repeatedly and long enough to reach past his well-defined jawline. His nose was large and very Romanesque but well suited to his face. You wished to see his eyes but as he was asleep you could only imagine what colour they could possibility be. As green as the forest that surrounded your home in England? A sight you had come to miss over the past two months. Possibly brown? Like the shades of wood, you saw on the ships that would come in and out of the harbour. Or possibly the brightest blue you ever saw? Brighter than the ocean beneath you, eyes that saw into your soul. You were an impatient person by nature, but you supposed you would have to wait until this mysterious boy woke. Moving from his closed eyes you traced further to his lips, they were parted as he slept which drew attention to how full and rosy they looked, and you had the sudden desire to kiss the boy to see if they were as soft as they looked.

You were never one to be overly interested in boys, there were a few down in the harbour that the other Governors’ daughters would fawn over and gossip about, but you never joined in on it. However, just looking at this boy before you made your stomach flutter. You perched on the bed by this side to inspect for any open wounds that you would need to clean, noticing that his linen undershirt was undone at the top, you saw a sparkle of gold when the boy breathed and without thinking you reached for the object around his neck . Two small cubes that hung as a pendant from the chain, with symbols on the side that you couldn’t quite make out. You attempted to bring them closer to you to get a better look at them when a large hand gripped you tightly around your wrist, making you squeak in fright.

“Where am I?” the voice that came from the boy was low and raspy, you immediately knew he had inhaled some smoke. You were finding it hard to speak, the shock of the boy waking and his grip on you was starting to hurt, the look you gave him must have let him know he was hurting you as he relaxed his grip slightly, though he shook your arm slightly to get you to answer.

You gave him your name, “Y-you’re on the Governors ship heading to Chandrila, we found you in the water on a raft and lifted you aboard, I’ve been told to care for you until we reach the island” your eyes never left his, the panicked look left his eyes at this and seemed to relax, though his hand never left your wrist. 

“Well, Miss L/N” he paused to smirk at you which just increased the fluttering sensation in your stomach, “it seems as if I owe you my life, my name is Ben Solo”. His voice, now being used more was still low, but it came out like honey, and you wished he would talk to you like that for the rest of your life.

“You should rest, Ben. We still have about a week’s sailing before we make it to the island. I will come by in the morning to see how you are" he released your wrist finally, the coldness of the room seeming more apparent now that his warmth had left you. He broke the eye contact between you so he could lower himself back on the bed. You got up to leave, seeing that he was slipping away into unconsciousness, and headed for the door. You turned around to get one last look of him before you went to your sisters’ room, he was sleeping quietly again, and you smiled.

Entering your sisters’ room, she was sat up in bed, waiting for you to arrive.

“You should be asleep” you called to her, going over to the armoire to change into your sleepwear.

“Is he awake? Who is he? Is he a pirate?” she was firing off question after question as you climbed into bed beside her.

“Elizabeth, go to sleep" you turned away from her, blowing out the light that stood on the bedside cabinet, submerging you both in darkness. Your sister huffed, turning around so that you had your backs to each other and after a few minutes you heard her breathing slow, signalling that she was asleep.

You however were anything but tired, the evening’s events catching up with you and being replayed in your mind. One thing stood out from the rest though before you did succumb to sleep, you were no longer questioning the colour of Ben's eyes, they were eyes you knew you would never forget, even in death. They sent chills through you, captivating you in a trance and knowing that you would never want to ever look away again. You fell asleep to the memory of looking into those eyes, eyes that looked like liquid gold.

* * *

The sun was starting to peak through the curtains of your sisters’ room when you woke, you were not one to normally rise willingly in the morning, but you had some motivation today. Ben. You washed yourself using the cloth and some fresh water from the pot on the dresser, rubbing away the grime that was left over from last night. After cleaning yourself up as best as you could, you rushed to the armoire to find a day dress for you to borrow from your sister until you could go to your own wardrobe. You had noticed that she had stolen your light blue day dress with white lace edging, it was probably your favourite item of clothing; after your comfortable riding trousers and tunic, and you felt a surge of annoyance raise in you towards her.

“It wouldn’t even fit you” you hissed under your breath, not wanting to wake her. You dressed yourself and tried to tackle your hair, you gave up after trying to pin it up for a good five minutes, letting it just hang loose, you just wanted to be out as quick as possible.

Leaving your sleeping sister behind, you silently snuck out of the room and headed towards the galley, where you knew there were spare clean cloths, fresh water and basic wound treatment creams and salves. You had learnt from the crew how to treat your wounds, if it wasn’t from receiving the cane to your hand you were normally patching yourself up due to rope burns or other accidents that came with manning a ship in secret. Retrieving the items you needed to help Ben, you made your way up to your chambers until a hand on your shoulder stopped you.

“Its a bit early in the morning to be wandering around the ship don’t you think, Miss L/N?” you turned to the man that was holding you in place and furrowed your brow at him.

“Well, Colonel, at my father’s suggestion, I will be looking after our new guest, so surely it makes sense for me to be about at this time?” you tried to shrug out of his grip on your shoulder but he just squeezed a little tighter.

“As the daughter of the Governor, you should request to have an escort, as you don’t want to be caught alone by a member of the crew who may have ill intentions towards you,” his green eyes bore into your own, sending an unpleasant shiver down your spine, “many men at sea like to act on their urges towards young and beautiful women, you should be careful who it is you place your trust in". You finally manged to rip your body away from his grasp.

“If you are insinuating that the crew on this ship would bring me any harm, Colonel, then I suggest you pay more attention to your crew. They have been nothing but respectful, _they_ have never laid an unwanted hand upon me" you laced as much venom in your voice as you could, the Colonel had always shown a unusual interest in you since you had known him, “now if you don’t mind, I will be leaving to attend to my duties.” You spun around and walked away with your chin up, leaving the young redhead behind you to stare after you with nothing but a chilling smirk upon his face.

You entered your room swiftly, locking the doors behind you so that Colonel Hux couldn’t attempt to enter without making his presence known first. You turned to face the bed, where you expected Ben to still be but found it empty. Puzzled, you looked around the rest of the room to see where he could be and hoping he wasn’t going through your drawers. You noted that the door to the balcony that overlooked the back of the ship was slightly ajar, walking towards it you took in the discarded dirty tunic that lay on the floor and gulped, preparing yourself to see the boy potentially shirtless.

Opening the door, you saw the back of Ben; pale skin with even more beauty marks covering his back, you could see the way his muscles were strained as he leaned on the railing, looking out at the ocean. His long dark hair blowing in the wind, watching him brush it back away from his face with one of his large hands. You were about to open your mouth to get his attention when you heard him mumbling;

“Adieu to you my Dinah,

a thousand times adieu

We're going away from the Holy Ground and the girls we all love true.

We will sail the salt seas over and then return for sure.

To see again the girls, we love and the Holy Ground once more.

You're the girl I do adore.

And still I live in hopes to see the Holy Ground once more...” you knew the tune well, it being a favourite of the sailors who would frequently sing it as they worked, but the song from Ben made you want to weep.

Stuck in your trance of listening to the boy in front of you singing, you hadn’t noticed that you were pushing the door open wider to hear better, and forgetting that the doors squeaked when opened, your movements cut off the song abruptly .

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt you! Please, like I said last night, I’m here to make sure you are ok” with a weak smile you lifted the jug of water and cloth in your hand, “were you hurt at all?”

The boy was still looking at you as if you were a ghost and turned around fully now so that you could see his bare chest, which brought your attention to the open wounds across his chest and arms; nothing too worrisome though, thank the gods.

“So you are real then, its either that or I’m still dreaming” he face softened after a moment, taking you in, his eyes raking up and down our figure which made you blush and look away from him, “well, if I am being given such a lovely carer it would sure be a waste to refuse the services" you didn’t think you could blush any deeper than you already were. You turned and walked back into your chambers, trying to hide your embarrassment from him, setting the water jug down on the table by your reading chair. Ben had followed you in, sitting down in the chair before you, getting as comfortable as he could be with his long legs spread outward, which meant that if you were to get close to him to clean him up, you would have to place yourself between them, you gulped at the thought.

As he was shirtless you could see the pendant that you had admired last night, hanging in the middle of his broad chest, the gold catching the light coming through the windows.

“Like what you see, little mouse?” you brought your eyes to his now, scowling at the pet name. You scoffed, pushing down your embarrassment you poured some water into an empty dish that was on the side, soaking one of the rags in the clean water you knelt in front of him, tugging his arm towards you to clean the cuts you saw there.

“I told you my name last night, use that or m'lady” he chuckled at you, he was starting to get on your nerves with his cockiness.

“Definitely not a little mouse, you clearly don’t take any shit, m'lady" you could tell he was baiting you, seeing how you would react to the swear word, if only he knew you spent most of your free time with sailors.

“I couldn’t give a fuck what anyone thinks, let alone a boy who managed to get themselves stranded in the middle of the Atlantic", you smirked at him then, still cleaning his wounds you picked up the salve from the side and applied some to each cut.

“I never knew ladies could speak such a way; we must alert the King of England! They clearly let a wild one loose, who knows what she will do?” even teasing his voice was low and husky. You looked at him again and the both of you laughed, “I can appreciate a girl who can hold her own, makes a far better sailing companion.”

“Speaking of sailing companions, how is it you ended up on a makeshift raft, unconscious in the middle of the ocean?” you asked, keeping your voice light so not to seem as if you were interrogating him, you knew your father and Hux would want to know why the boy was stranded, and what he was doing before it happened.

“The ship I was on was attacked; never thought I’d still be alive after the attack. It seems luck was on my side,” he answered flinching slightly as you rubbed the salve into his skin. You took a break from cleaning his wounds to get him a large glass of water, assuming he hadn’t had anything to drink for a while. Ben gave his thanks as you handed it to him, downing the glass in one.

“What were you doing to cause an attack on the ship you were on?” pouring another glass full for him, you tried to pry more into how he ended up there, a voice in the back of your minds was thinking that he could possibly be a pirate.

Ben gave you a look which made you think he knew what you were thinking, “If that is your coy way to ask me if I am a pirate, little mouse, then you really don’t have a lot of experience in getting information from others,” you frowned at him, “I know you are only here to get me to talk under the guise of helping me, and if I don’t then I am probably going to become a punching bag until I give up my secrets.” He finished, that infuriating smirk back on his face.

“Lucky for me though, I can be honest. I just so happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Ben continued, taking the glass of water from you again, this time taking smaller mouthfuls, “I was searching for my father, an officer in the Navy according to my late mother. I traded my work for free passage on the ship, we were heading to Takonda when we were raided by pirates.” He finished, looking at you as you took in his story.

“How do I know what you are telling me is the truth?” you crossed your arms over your chest, the look in your eyes daring him to be untruthful.

He laughed, “You don’t, you will just have to trust me” you eyed him, the feeling you got from him was that he was telling you the truth. You let your arms fall, grabbing the soaked cloth again to clean up the rest of his wounds.

“Suppose I will have to,” you gave him a small smile, and continued to fix him up as best as you could.

* * *

During the rest of your time aboard the ship, Ben had been taken care of and moved below deck to sleep in the hammocks with the rest of the crew and was put to work immediately. After relaying his story to Hux and your father they also deemed Ben to be telling the truth, though the Colonel eyed the boy suspiciously which put you on edge. Ben had also accepted to work with the Blacksmith once they arrived in Chandrila, saying that he had previous work in the small smith shop back in England.

In the week before docking at Chandrila, you seemed to be spending more and more of your free time with Ben. You first started being around each other more when he realised you were shadowing the Boatswain, wearing your brimmed hat low on your head so not to be easily identified by the higher officers. He teased you for that saying how you looked like a boy in your riding trousers and tunic, you countered him saying how that was the whole point, and from there you two were as thick as thieves.

Ben didn’t really like to talk all that much about himself, though he did tell you that that he was sixteen, from Great Yarmouth; another Port town, and that he worked as a Blacksmiths apprentice until his mother died. You had figured out that even though he had acted cocky and charming with you to start with, he was actually quite shy with others, though he did still tease you a lot and would flash you that smirk when you would start to blush. You knew he liked to sing, although only when he thought he was alone and on the rare occasions you caught him, he would blush so hard, even his ears would turn red. You tried to tell him that you liked his singing and if he ever felt comfortable enough to do so that you wouldn’t mind, but even before you could get the sentence out he would either change the topic or walk away to do another job.

He always seemed to be pushing his hair back out of his face, one evening you had enough of the incessant brushing and made him sit between your legs, his back to your chest, and braided the top portion of his hair into three sections, bringing them together into a small bun at the crown of his head. You could see the tips of his ears turning red when the other sailors whistled at you both and you held back a smirk, you heard him clear his chest and mutter a quick thanks. He kept them in for the remainder of the trip and had to ask you once to redo it, going red again when he did, because it came out and he couldn’t do it as well as you. He also seemed to have a temper at times, when he would get frustrated he could just start to lose it, most of the time you would guide him to the stern of the ship and let the waves calm him as they did you. You were similar in that way, both of you loved the sea, feeling somewhat more at home on the boat than on land.

You would still have to spend your days with your sister and the Matron, which you begrudgingly did to keep your father happy, knowing that your evenings would be spent laughing with Ben and working on the ship helped you get through the day. Ben spent his days working with the ships Carpenter, making repairs as they went, something you would much rather be doing.

Ben would ask you what you had learnt that day, teasing you when you ended up in a rant of how what you were supposed to be learning wasn’t useful and that all it did was encourage women to become carbon copies of each other in order to please their husbands.

“M’lady doth protest to her teachings? But how is she supposed to know how to serve her future husband? For women are nothing more than property, something pretty to look at whilst her husband rises high,” Ben put on a voice of snobbery, making him sound like some of the officers that served under Colonel Hux. You hit him on the arm, as you couldn’t reach up that high to swat him on the head, he was still rather tall for a sixteen-year-old and you knew he would still be growing.

“How will Colonel Hux take the news when he finds out his future wife is a wild miscreant, and a little shit to boot?” you hit him harder.

“For fuck sake, Ben! How many times do I have to tell you? I will not be marrying that man! I don’t know why you have it in your head that I will be” no one could hear to talk such a way about the Colonel as you were both below deck, taking some time out in an unoccupied room to practice with swords, Ben was teaching you as you had won a bet against him to see who could rig the sails up to the mast the quickest.

“I’ve seen the way he looks at you, as if you belong to him already, its disturbing. Also, seeing as he will be living on Chandrila and you are the oldest daughter of the Governor, it actually makes sense in the creepiest way possible.” He leaned against the wall, folding his arms in front of him and looking at you with an eyebrow cocked upwards.

“He is vile, surely my father wouldn’t allow it. Just on the age difference alone. Hopefully by then I can escape his clutches and sail away,” you chuckled at the thought of it, “now stop ranting about him and teach me how to stab things” you wandered over to him to give him a shove with your side, which seemed to bring his attention back to you.

“Let’s leave the stabbing until we can get you a dummy to poke holes into, rather than me. Until then you just want to work on your stance and getting used to the rapier.” Ben chuckled at you, handing you the small blade he had manged to find.

You had been practising for over two hours, and Ben was not easy on you, he had knocked you down multiples of times, saying you needed to learn the right footing and build your strength in order to have the advantage in an actual fight. You were taking a break, Ben telling you how different swords gave you different advantages and disadvantages when you heard the tell-tale creak of someone descending the staircase. You hid your swords and tried to make it seem as if you were both collecting something to take above deck when you heard the man speak.

“Mr Solo, I have granted you permission to stay upon my ship so that you could be of an actual service. Not so that you could play with swords with Miss L/N,” the commanding voice of Colonel Hux rooted you both to the spot, both of you eyes wide, not knowing how he knew, “yes, Miss L/N, I know it’s you in the hat. I know what you have been getting up to in your evenings as well. You should be wise enough to know not to spend time with the sorts that include Mr Solo,” you both scowled at him then, he was insinuating that Ben was nothing but a scalawag, you were about to speak up when Hux continued, “We will be arriving at Chandrila in the morning, I would hope that your late night wanderings will come to an end from this moment on, or perhaps the patrolling guards will have to bring you back to your father" he was now threatening you, disguised as a request for your safety.

“Mr Solo,” Hux turned to address Ben again, “I understand that you wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to Miss L/N, correct?” Ben nodded, he and Hux seemed to be squaring up to each other in some way, eyes never leaving the other, “you would do well to remember your place then. You will be escorted to the _blacksmith_ in the morning, so I would suggest you bid Miss L/N goodnight so that she can begin to pack her things that are being sent to the _Governor’s_ _House_.” The way Hux emphasised both blacksmith and the Governor’s house unsettled you, as if he was trying to get a point across to Ben. You weren’t quite sure what was going on in this moment between the young men, but after a long pause, Hux turns to you and bids goodnight and retreats up the stairs.

When you both hear the door close you release the breath you had been holding.

“What was that all about?” you questioned Ben, who you noticed was still staring at the door that Hux went through, balling his fists at the sides and nostrils flaring, you could sense the first signs of him about to have an outburst. You stepped closer to him now, grabbing his arm and turning him to you.

“Hey, look at me,” you pulled on his arm harder when he tried to look back at the door, “Hux can say whatever he wants, but he’s not going to stop us being friends" you looked at Ben in the eyes, trying to convey in them that you were telling the truth, his golden hues never blinking. 

You could tell he was still angry and so you wrapped your arms around his middle and hugged him tight. You could tell you had caught him off guard, as it took him a few moments to bring his own arms around you and reciprocate the hug, placing his cheek on the top of your head. You stood there for a few moments in each other’s arms, enjoying the warmth that Ben always radiated. You could feel the cool metal of his pendant on your cheek, hugging him like this made you very aware of how much taller he was than you.

You broke apart somewhat reluctantly.

“Do you mean it?” he asked, voice as low as ever, “you’re not going to stop being my friend?”.

You scoffed at him, “Didn’t I tell you that I was to take care of you? That’s not going to stop even when we leave this ship", you gave him a wicked smile and elbowed him in the side, “plus I still expect to have a teacher to poke holes into” he laughed at that.

“Whatever m'lady commands, she shall receive,” he bent into a low bow, clearly mocking you and you hit him on the arm again to get him to stand up properly. You smiled at each other for a moment more before you excused yourself to leave to go and pack, like Hux had instructed.

You had reached the top of the stairs and glanced back at Ben who was still stood in the same place , you gave him a small smile, which he returned, and retreated out of the door, leaving Ben to stand there and watch you leave, unbeknownst to you that his face fell as soon as you turned away.


	2. Sundays and Broken Promises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two years have passed since you had met Ben Solo, you feelings for him growing for him each passing day, though it seems he only sees you as his friend, though after some birthday celebrations feelings may change.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter ! Would have been up sooner but i had to work :(   
> Let me know in the comments what you think !

Your sister was rummaging through your armoire, throwing your dresses around the room, clearly unsatisfied with her own wardrobe that she decided to raid yours instead, the noise of her actions being loud enough to wake you. Opening an eye to see the mess she had caused made you internally curse her out.

“Lizzie. If you want new clothes, go and ask father so you can get the _fuck_ out of my room”, you were rubbing your eyes and midway through a yawn when she turned on her heel and walked towards you, stopping by the side of your bed, arms crossed.

“Father will only order me the dresses he deems appropriate, it’s not fair! Why do you get the better dresses? I don’t want to look like a little girl anymore who plays with dolls, I want to look like you”, Elizabeth moaned, you rolled your eyes at her.

“Elizabeth, you are thirteen you do not need, nor want the dresses I have to wear, be grateful you are not being made to wear a corset. Bloody vile things. And even if you did, you don’t have the tits to show off”, you snickered at her, her hands going to her chest as if to cover herself up, “and you know fine well that Father didn’t order my dresses, or we would have the same wardrobe”, you sneered at her, both of you knew that the newly appointed Commodore had put in the order for your attire.

In the two years since your arrival to Chandrila, Commodore Hux’s presence in your life seemed more and more unrelenting, he practically lived at the Governor’s house with your family and staff. One of the weekly appearances from him was every Sunday for the midday service where yourself, your Father and sister, along with Hux, would be expected to greet each resident of Chandrila who was attending the service, Hux standing by your side as if you were already his wife to flaunt around. You had no say in what you wore as it was already chosen for you, so the fact that your sister was jealous of you made your blood boil.

Before Elizabeth could protest even further about how her life wasn’t fair; and why did you get all the pretty things, and you should be grateful that a man like the Commodore wanted to marry you, because no one else would, your maid, Maria, walked in. That was Lizzie’s cue to leave, as her own maid would be looking for her to help her get ready for today’s service.

“Excuse me, Miss L/N, but your bath is ready,” Maria said, never making direct eye contact. You sighed, wishing that she had a little more backbone, just so that you could have one friend inside the house.

“Lizzie, piss off”, Maria let out a small squeak at your cursing. You never knew if she told the rest of the staff about how you would curse like a seasoned sailor around the house, but your father nor Hux ever brought you up on it; although they could also be used to it by now that they have given up on correcting you on your manners.

Elizabeth huffed, giving one last yearning look towards your scattered wardrobe, then left your room. You got out of your bed, stretching fully before you headed to follow Maria towards the bath chamber. Once inside, you stripped of your nightwear and climbed into the deep tub, hissing slightly at the first contact of the hot water but then letting out a long sigh of relief as you fully submerged yourself. Pondering over what torture device you would be made to wear today as you scrubbed yourself clean, no doubt it would be something to show off your cleavage. Why Hux believed that having your tits out at Church was appropriate, you’d never know.

After washing away as much dirt as you could, you pulled yourself out of the bath and grabbed one of the towels from the side, drying yourself off as best as you could before the small army of staff aided you into your dress. You had learned a long time ago that you didn’t have time to be self-conscious of your body, as your helpers would be ripping your towel away and seeing you as naked as the day you were born, you had learned to deal with it by now.

As if on cue, the assortment of girls came clambering into your chamber, followed by your Matron who oversaw their work, you were pulled behind the room divider where today's dress hung. You braced yourself for the tight corset that held you in place, the one upside of the corset was how it kept your posture upright instead of slouching, which came in good use for when you were practising with your sword.

You would go through the different fighting stances that you would use whilst practising with your swords in your head whilst being fitted, distracting your mind from the pain and lack of breathing ability. Then once you had gone through all the ones you knew, you would move onto the different tasks you would do on the docked ships, listing the order everything needed to be done. Keeping the processes fresh in your mind each day, so that when the time came for you to leave this island, you knew exactly how to get away.

Once your corset and dress had been strapped onto you as tightly as they could possibly make it, they sat you in a chair facing the mirror from your vanity so they could put your hair up in the ever so popular fontange style. You preferred it down or even in a simple braid to keep it off your face, as after a while all the pins in it started to hurt, but again, you didn’t really get a choice in the matter.

Now standing in front of the floor length mirror, you took in the outfit that was handpicked for you. The first thing you thought when you saw it was that you hoped Ben would like it, and you found yourself blushing at the thought. Thankfully you didn’t have to wear a large and awkward petticoat underneath it, so it hung quite nicely from your hips, and the train wasn’t too long. You have had a previous embarrassing experience from a train that was much too long, and it got snagged on everything making you fall over quite a bit, which Ben still wouldn’t let you live down to this day. Looking back at the front you took in the peculiar colour, a shade of greens and blues which reminded you of deep water, one of your maids had called it teal, and the trim on the deep square neckline was black velvet with gold beads sewn into it. The sleeves were long and billowing from the wrist, with more material in back than the front so you were still able to hold something without too many issues, they were also probably good for hiding things up your sleeves, which could come in handy.

As per usual you wore your black laced up boots, the only type of heel you would wear as all the others were uncomfortable to walk in. All in all, you quite liked this dress, and apart from your tits being up near your chin, you would happily wear it again.

That was until you saw the jewellery that came with it. Hux seemed to have a thing for necklaces that resembled collars, and it made you feel like a prized pet rather than a woman. The diamond encrusted blue stone; that was the same shade as your dress, was attached to a black satin ribbon that was fastened tightly to your neck, making you feel like you couldn’t breathe. You suspected the Commodore was into choking. The earrings matched the stone on the necklace, making them feel as if they were being dragged down to your shoulders at the weight of them.

You sighed; going over your stances again in order to calm your mind as you left your room heading towards the foyer where the carriage would be waiting to take you to the church service. As you descended the stairs, you saw a figure waiting for you at the bottom, unfortunately for you it was Hux.

“Miss L/N, you look lovely today”, the Commodore held out his arm for you to take, taking it somewhat unwillingly as your etiquette classes drilled you to do what was proper, he was dressed in his uniform, which he seemed to never take off.

“Is that a new dress?” the redhead asked, feigning innocence as if he didn’t know when he bought it exactly. You internally scowled at him, fixing a false smile on your face as you looked at him, thinking of all the ways you could hurt this man.

“Why yes, Commodore, thank you for noticing”, he led you outside to where your father and sister were waiting for you both. Your father looking at you as if you two were a perfect match; making you wretch at the thought, whilst your sister looked at you in envy, she also had a new dress, but even you could agree it wasn’t as nice as your own.

You loved your sister, even though she was an entitled brat, but you hoped for her sake that she would never have to be in the position you were facing, and that she got to choose her future husband.

You all entered the carriage and soon enough you were on your way into town. The ride wasn’t long, which you were grateful for as you were seated next to Hux and you could feel his knee touching yours, even the thought of him touching you in any way repulsed you.

Thankfully the carriage came to a stop outside of the church, and you got out to stand in your usual place at the front where you would be greeting the rest of the islands occupants, although Hux decided to make a bold move and place his hand at the small of your back, guiding you to the spot next to him.

“Thank you, Commodore, but I do believe I know where I need to stand”, you ground out, moving quicker so that he couldn’t keep his hand on you for very long. Fortunately, most of the townspeople were already queued up ready to go inside. They went by saying hello to us all, complementing both you and your sister on your dresses, some of the boys flirted with you; which seeing that Hux would tense up when they did, you would always flirt back with them so you could fuck with Hux. There was nothing wrong with playful flirting with the boys on the island, though your father believed it would get you into trouble one day, you knew better though as there was one person who you could count on to defend you from any unwanted advances.

You knew by now that Ben would always be that last one in the line to greet you and your family, and so you waited patiently until you saw the familiar head of long silky black hair. A dark, looming frame now walking towards you, Ben was looking as handsome as ever. The top portion of his hair was still braided back into a bun, to keep it out of his eyes when he was working, though you had found some gold thread to mix in there which brought out his eyes more. He would make you plait it back on the days it fell out, saying how it never went right when he did it himself, you would just roll your eyes at him whilst you unceremoniously dragged him down to sit in front of you, his back to your chest as you redid his hair. 

As per usual he was dressed head to toe in black, which in contrast to his pale complexion made him stand out even more. You could see the outline of his muscles even through his shirt and waistcoat, arms as thick as tree trunks made you bite the inside of your cheek, your face starting to redden slightly. You had been harbouring feelings for Ben for a while now, and you would catch yourself staring at him, admiring his ass as you trained with him or trying to sneak glances of his broad chest when he took his shirt off on the boats. You knew it was probably one sided, assuming he only saw you as a younger sister or just as a friend, Ben got a lot of interest from the other girls in town and you knew he had taken some of them out on dates. You were happy though just being his friend, as he was the only one you had really.

You flashed a smile at him when he stood in front of you all, his eyes lingering on you for a second before he turned to your father.

“Governor, you are looking well. I have been asked to pass on a message from Mr Jacobs, he sends his apologies as he cannot make today's service due to finishing off that large order from yourself”, Ben bowed to your father, knowing that he could be more informal when speaking to the Governor as the two men got on rather well.

“Ah, young Mr Solo, yes that is perfectly fine. I will admit that it is an uncharacteristically large number of weapons that we are ordering, just enlisted a load of new recruits you see. Though I am surprised Mr Jacobs allowed you to show up for today's service at all, as he needs all the hands he can get”, your father chuckled at Ben, the two men smiling at each other.

“And miss seeing Chandrila’s two most beautiful ladies? I wouldn’t think of it”, Ben chortled, he could be a smooth talker when he wanted to be. He moved to your sister, bowing low and taking her hand in his.

“Miss Elizabeth, looking as enchanting as ever,” he kissed her hand which made your sister blush, you rolled your eyes. Ben knew Lizzie was easily won with flattery and he would always go out of his way to make her feel special.

“Thank you, Ben, though I do wish I could have a dress like Y/N, but father says I have to wait until I am older”, your sister pouted, and Ben let out a small laugh.

“You should listen to your father, he knows what is best”, he responded with a strained smile on his lips, Ben knew exactly where your dresses were coming from and didn’t agree with it at all. The countless rants the two of you had about Hux was testament to that.

He turned to you now, taking you in as he looked you up and down, bowing low again to take your hand and bringing it to his lips he slipped a small piece of parchment into it so that no one could see. Something was different about his eyes as he scanned you; their normal golden hues going darker resembling amber, the look he gave made your thighs clench and he smirked at you, as if knowing the effect he had.

“M’lady, I see you too have acquired a new dress, and I must say that it looks positively…”, he paused for a long moment, wetting his lips with the tip of his tongue as he decided on the right word, “… ravishing”. Now it was your turn to blush, his choice of words making you believe that he was undressing you with his eyes, which caused you to blush deeper. Next to you, Hux cleared his throat, which brought you back from the trance Ben had left you in.

“Thank you, Ben, and may I be the first to wish you a Happy Name Day. I do hope you have some plans to celebrate, now that you are eighteen”, you smiled at him whilst you brought your hands back together so you could hide your note.

“Thank you for saying so”, he said with a smile, “and no, nothing large, just spending the night at the docks with a few friends from town”, he winked at you, you knew that wasn’t the plan at all.

“Oh, Y/N, why didn’t you mention something sooner? Ben, for all your help over these past few years please accept a token of congratulations. I will have it delivered to you later today”, your father said, ever the chivalrous man.

“Thank you, Governor, though I wouldn’t want to cause you any trouble”.

“Not at all, dear boy. It’s not every day a young man turns eighteen”, your father countered, still smiling up at the tall man in front of you. Ben nodded appreciatively at your father, and then turned to you, giving you a subtle wink as he walked to greet Hux.

All the warmth from the previous greetings left as soon as the two men stood eye to eye, and you tensed knowing that despite their countless conversations, the two men beside you hated one another. Every word spoken seemed to be laced with double meanings, so cleverly worded that even your father couldn’t pick up on them.

“Well, Mr Solo, it seems a congratulations are in order. Eighteen. There are so many things you can go off and do. Which would be your choice; Enlist in the Navy? Marry a pretty lady? Move back to England to start a new life? Or perhaps even all of them, I know how _determined_ you are”, Hux emphasised.

“Unfortunately, the young lady I would like to offer my hand to is not of marrying age, so I will have to wait, and then ask her father for his permission. Then of course the decision is up to her if she chose to take my hand. I wouldn’t want to stake a claim on her if her heart belonged to someone else, would I Commodore?”, Ben replied, eyes never leaving Hux’s.

You felt a wave of jealousy overcome you, as you didn’t know that Ben had his heart set on someone. You supposed you shouldn’t be surprised, he was handsome and nearly all the girls in your school fancied him, saying the at even for a blacksmith they would do anything to have a night with him. And Ben was the biggest flirt you had ever met, he could talk the knickers off a girl before she would even know it, he could have them melting like putty in his hands for him if he chose to. When you would walk around the town with your school mates, Ben would always make an appearance and take the time to chat to all of the young ladies in your class, they would hang onto every word he said and giggle at him, batting their eyelashes at him before he would have to leave to go back to work. Some of the things that came out of the girl’s mouths when they spoke about him as he left shocked even you. You would relay what they had said about Ben to him when you would meet up in the evenings, if only they could see how he blushed.

The two men were still glaring at each other when your father spoke up.

“Well, we best be getting inside, don’t want to be late for Father Tottem’s service”, the two young men finally broke eye contact, and Ben nodded at your father and made his way inside. You closely followed behind your father and sister, when you felt the presence of Hux’s hand on your back again as you walked down the aisle to your seats.

Not being a girl of faith meant that to you, the service seemed to drag on. So you let your mind wander to your evening plans with Ben. You had produced the idea yourself and you were immensely proud that so far it was going according to plan.

You had kept your promise to Ben and continued to keep seeing each other during your evenings, you would sneak out dressed in Ben’s old clothes, which you had had to alter so that they would fit you, and make your way down to the blacksmiths. Mr Jacobs knew who you really were, but he never told a soul about you being there, as you would help him and Ben with work, for free. Ben also had kept his promise about teaching you how to use a sword, using the back room of the building to practice with all the varieties of weapons that you made together, he said for you to get used to different styles so that you could at least now how to wield different weapons if you found yourself caught in a tricky spot. You had yet to beat him though, and you blamed his reluctance to teach you all his secrets, him saying that he couldn’t give everything away or how else would he best you in a fight?

Some days you would go onto the boats, and help the sailors who worked on them, letting them teach you how to work on different types of boats, which you vowed to commit to memory. Other days you would just sit with Ben on a portion of beach that was covered from the main road, watching the sea as you talked about your futures and how you were both going to sail away and make something for yourself. Those were your favourite days, though you would have to be more careful when out as the patrolling guards had nearly caught you a few times. Hux had made sure to keep his word on that. You were suspicious that Hux knew you were sneaking out, and all he needed to keep you in under his watchful eye was proof that you were going out.

That is why for Ben’s birthday you had orchestrated the whole plan and it was fool proof.

When you had asked Ben what he wanted to do for his birthday, he had told you that he just wanted a quiet night with you on the beach sharing a bottle of rum as you watched the sunset together, nothing extravagant. 

Knowing that your father liked Ben, you wanted to exploit his kindness and hatred of being embarrassed by exposing that today was in fact Ben’s eighteenth birthday. Your father, not wanting to seem rude and forgetful; after all that Ben has given to your family, would feel obliged to give him a suitable gift to save himself from embarrassment, a bottle of rum. You had both gotten the taste for rum when a couple of the sailors were at the harbour for one of their stag do’s and they had invited you both to join in on the celebrations. You did not drink it often but since it was a special day you decided to treat yourselves.

Deciding on the fake story to use when you would ask about his plans, so that you could throw Hux off the scent, and Ben would make sure to be seen down at the docks with a few of the sailors by the patrol men who you know would be given instructions by Hux to make sure he was there. You would then sneak out in your disguise and meet Ben down at the secluded beach, keeping an eye out for more patrollers.

It was long winded but worth it, ever since you two met Ben was your only friend on Chandrila.

You were roused out of your daydream when your sister dragged you up so that you could sing the final hymns, and you were grateful that the service was nearly over. After the hymns, you and your family would be the first to leave so that you could say goodbye to everyone as they left to go about the rest of their days. Walking up the aisle and heading towards the doors you felt Hux’s hand back on your back, you tried to swat it away as discreetly as you could but to no avail, just wishing he could keep his hands to himself. You then looked to find Ben, as you always did and found him on the aisle seat right at the back, you would normally roll your eyes at one another to communicate how boring you both found the service but today his face was pressed into a hard line and clearly looking at the man standing next to you. You frowned at him when you noticed the tell-tale twitch in his eye that indicated he was angry.

Ben’s anger had not lessened in the time you knew him, if anything more things could set him off and you spent a lot of your time trying to calm him down, some days all you would have to do was take his arm and drag him away from the situation, but others he couldn’t calm down until he had wrecked something to the point of no return.

You could feel that it was one of those days and you couldn’t go off with him to try and calm him as you had to head back up to the house.

He came over to give a quick goodbye to you all, letting out a small sigh as you watched him stalk away, heading back in the directions of the blacksmiths, you feared what state the back room would be in when you visited it tomorrow.

In the carriage back up to the house, you only hoped that Ben would not get too lost in his anger and forget the plan you had both created, as after today you needed some time away from Hux. Still clutching the note he gave you in your sleeve, you wondered what this week’s message was; most of the notes were either little bits of information about boats that Ben found out from the sailors as he could spend more time with them; reminders of the weeks patrol as they changed from time to time; sometimes he just wrote down some really crappy jokes that still made you laugh. All you knew was that no matter what was on the scrap of parchment, you would always get one every Sunday and you would store them all in a little box that you kept under your bed, and then on nights you couldn’t sleep you would fetch them out and read them.

Slipping out of the carriage, you attempted to excuse yourself to your room so you could get ready for dinner until a hand came to your wrist, holding you in place.

“Y/N”, you glared at Hux and his hand tightened on your wrist to the point that it was hurting, you had told him numerous times not to use your first name but he never listened, “I have a matter to discuss with you in my office before dinner, if you would do the honour of joining me”, you could tell by his tone that he wasn’t going to give you the chance to deny the offer.

“Commodore, I request again that you please call me Miss L/N”, you hissed, your hatred for the man before you seeping out now that there no one was around, “I actually have a prior engagement to attend to before dinner, so I will have to respectfully decline”.

Hux’s hand was twisting your wrist, making you squeak in pain and a cold smile flashed briefly on his face.

“How about m’lady then? How does that work for you instead? It seems you prefer that title, letting just anybody use it”, you stared him down not wanting to show him he was getting to you, he only ever acted like this when your father was busy elsewhere and you two were alone. That is another reason you refused to go to his office without anyone else present.

“Let. Go. Of. Me.”, You warned, grinding out each word, knowing he had already left a mark on you.

“You know, one of these days you are going to regret speaking to me with anything but respect. And you will come to learn eventually what happens when you don’t respect me”, bringing a long pale finger up to stroke down your face and neck stopping at your choker, “and learn the benefits you will receive from being obedient.” You shivered with repulsion at his insinuation and ripped your arm out of his wrist with as much force as you could muster.

“The only way I will obey you, is if you are asking me to stick a knife through your back”, glaring at him as you rubbed your injured wrist, allowing the blood flow to return.

Hux could only chuckle, “Hmm, we will see about that, M’lady”.

Spinning away from him you all but ran up the stairs to your room, back to the door you held back a cry of anger. Why couldn’t your father see how rotten the Commodore was, though if he did then he chose to ignore it, you weren’t sure what was worse, the sheer ignorance of his actions or allowing it to happen and doing nothing about it. You knew no formal request for your hand had been raised, due to you still only being sixteen, but you knew you were still expected to be handed off to him, being treated as nothing more than a prized mare at the market.

If anyone could give Ben’s anger issues a run for their money it was you, though you preferred to internalise your anger and then save it so you could take it out whilst sword fighting, there had been a few times where all you saw was red and once you had come out of your rage, the training dummies that you and Ben had made were nothing but a pile of tatters. Ben would stay out of the way until you were done, so not to accidentally gut him, and then pull you into a hug and rub soothing circles into your back as you sobbed into his chest.

Today though you didn’t have anything to take your anger on as you were expected to go down for dinner in an hour and then you would be sneaking out later tonight, so you went to your window and opened it all the way, letting the salt breeze wash over you. Standing there for a long time as you thought about running away, starting a new life where no one knew who you were and expected you to do things a certain way, for the chance to make your own choices.

Realising that you still hadn’t read Ben’s note you pulled up your sleeve to receive it, ignoring the already purple hand print on your wrist, you unfolded the square to find a short scribble of words and though you had to squint to read it properly, your heart swelled at the four little words.

‘You are not alone’.

* * *

You made sure to wait a few hours after dinner had finished before you snuck out to meet Ben, just in case anybody came to your room without warning. 

In the first few weeks of you moving to Chandrila, you had found a set of servants’ stairs from the storage room next to the bath chamber that led outside to the stables. Using them ever since as you noticed that none of the other staff seemed to use this staircase.

You had found a loose panel in the wall and hid your go to clothes; a simple white linen shirt, thin waistcoat, black breeches and cavaliers and your oversized hat as well as your most prized possession, your rapier.

Ben had gifted it to you a few months ago on your sixteenth birthday, he said he made it himself and taking extra time out of his day so that it was perfect for you. And it really was. A shorter blade than most but it fit well to your height, with a black hand guard that twisted in the most intricate way, nothing over the top which is how you liked it. The balance of it was perfect, and you had been practising with it most evenings since you got it. Ben had also put together a scabbard and crossbelt that fit perfectly to you, blushing when you remembered the way he had held your hips as he adjusted the sides so that it hung at a more comfortable angle and the way how his massive hands seemed to span your entire waist. You had noticed afterwards that he had even embossed the leather so that it had your initials above where your scabbard would be, and next to it was a small carving of a mouse. He was unable to control the guffaws of laughter directed at you when you proceeded to hit him, which meant he called you a little mouse for the rest of the evening. You hated the nickname, but you were still incredibly grateful for the gift.

Slipping out of your room in your nightdress, you headed towards the storage room. On the alert for any noise and appreciating that your room was the closest to the storage room, you slipped inside closing the door as quietly as you could behind you.

Changing quickly, you shoved your nightdress back into the loose panel and secured it in place so that if anyone was to look at the wall, they wouldn’t think anything of it. Heading down the stairs, you held onto your sword at your belt, keeping it from hitting the wall so that it wouldn’t make any noise. You exited out of the door and headed out of the stables. Stopping again to keep an eye out for anyone who may be outside, and once you determined that your path was free, you headed into the surrounding trees.

It took you about half an hour to run to the beach, holding your hat to your head so it wouldn’t blow away, your hair down and blowing behind you.

You were the first one to make it to the beach, you supposed that Ben got caught up one way or another, so you decided to make a small fire to keep you both warm for after the sun went down.

You had your boots off now, digging your toes into the sand whilst looking out at the sunset and how the light bounced off the sea, when suddenly you were thrown over a large shoulder, sand going everywhere. Large hands on your backs and thighs so you wouldn’t fall off, you felt your captor running as you let out a scream, scrambling in their hold so that you could hold onto something, knowing exactly what their plan was.

“Ben! Don’t you dare! Not again! No- Agh”, Ben’s booming laugh was all you could hear as he threw you both into the shallow water. You removed yourself out of his grip, cursing him every way you knew as you had to clamber around in the water to retrieve your hat.

“Every time”, Ben was still laughing, his face flushed slightly which indicated that he had started to drink without you, “you know if you actually paid attention to your surroundings you wouldn’t be dripping wet right now”.

Shoving past him to get out of the freezing water, you wandered out to go sit by the fire you had made, ignoring the large man behind you who tried to pull you back to him. He laughed at you again, placing himself next to you on the sand so you were sat shoulder to shoulder, turning your head away from him as you silently sulked.

“You can’t be mad at me today, its not allowed”, he said, smiling wide so that you could see his teeth. You tried to glare at him, but you could not fight the smile that was appearing on your lips. Ben wrapped one of his arms around your shoulder and squeezed you into him, you hit him on the leg when you couldn’t breathe, letting go of you as he moved to rest on his hands behind him, stretching the rest of his large body on the sand to bask in the setting sun.

“Cough it up, Solo, after all my hard work, you should at least give me a drink”, you said smirking as you held out your hand, waiting for Ben to pass the bottle to you. He reached over to where his own boots lay, where he had dropped them and the bottle before he ambushed you, and uncorked the green bottle taking a quick slug of it before passing it to you. Tasting the vanilla and molasses on your tongue as you took a long swig, wincing slightly as it burned the back of your throat, passing it back to Ben who took another quick sip, then placed the bottle in front of you both in the sand.

You had taken a liking to rum more than wine, as it was sweeter, though you had realised one night that it did get you drunk a lot quicker so you knew you had to pace yourself for the evening ahead. You liked the effect it had on you, making you feel warm and floaty, though it did make you a little spacey which Ben found hilarious when you would ask him such bizarre questions. 

“Remind me to hide my rum when you are around, when I have my own stash that is, as you would probably drink the lot”, laughing at Ben’s words, you shoved him slightly and grabbed the bottle again to take another swig before placing it back.

“If today has shown anything, the only way you are going to get your own stash is through me, so I feel entitled to at least half”, you retorted smugly with your nose in the air and hands on your hips.

“A quarter”, he countered, still smiling at you.

“Two thirds”, you looked back at him and got up on your knees so that you were taller than him.

“Two thirds is more than half, Y/N. And you are tiny, one third or nothing at all”, he looked up at you with that infuriating smirk that sent jolts of electricity down your spine.

“Well its nice to see that your mathematics is improving”, you teased, winking at him, “and okay, deal”, you stuck out your hand so you could shake on it. He took your hand and pulled you back down onto the sand, picking up the bottle and running from you.

“That deal includes this bottle too, little mouse”, he shouted over his shoulder, you ran after him in circles around the fire which wasn’t easy in the sand. You did manage to jump onto his back, wrapping your arms around his neck and legs around his waist as he held one of your thighs to him so you wouldn’t fall off, the other hand bringing the bottle back to his lips as he twirled you both around in the sand. Laughing hysterically, you grabbed for the bottle again and yanked it from his grip. Noticing that it was already half empty and you could feel yourself becoming tipsier by the second.

Ben stopped by the water; both of his hands holding you now as you held the bottle for you both, you felt him rub small, light circles with his thumbs into your legs, as you watched the horizon for the final moments of the sunset.

“Happy birthday, Ben”, you whispered into his ear as you carefully gave him a swig of the bottle, making sure you didn’t tip it too much. You felt his grip tighten on you a bit and unlike Hux’s grip, Ben's touch always made you feel secure and would make your body tingle.

Both of you looking out at the ocean and watching the waves, if you could choose a moment to live in forever it would be this one. Resting your chin on Ben's shoulder, the two of you watching the distant ships pass by as the sky turned darker, you took another big swig of rum before you started to sing, Ben joining in only moments later as he set you back down so you could both dance around the fire together.

After you had both finished singing; Ben’s voice significantly better than your own as you couldn’t carry a tune to save your life, you both fell over, bottle of rum now in Ben’s hand but now nearly empty. Giggling at him; a tell-tale sign that you were drunk, as you knelt in between Ben’s open legs, one of your hands steadying yourself on his shoulder. He looked up at you; smile still as wide as ever, he had that look in his eyes again from earlier today, pupils blown wide making them look almost black. You moved closer to him, bringing your hand to his hair to undo the braids at the top that were starting to fall out.

“Your hair is so soft…” you said before you caught your fingers in some of the knots that had gotten tangled, causing you to pull on them slightly to get them free, and you heard the almost inaudible moan come from Ben’s mouth. Moving your eyes to his at the sound, you realised you were inches away from his face, both of your breathing still laboured from your dancing around was now hitting you both in the face, chests almost touching each other. You held one another’s gaze for a few moments until his eyes drop to your lips when you unconsciously whetted them with the tip of your tongue.

In that instant, his lips crashed to yours almost hungrily, as though you were the first meal he had had in years. Being caught off guard, you were unresponsive for a moment until one of his hands came to your side and gripped you tightly, you put a hand on his chest and he pulled away slightly, your noses still touching, his breath heating your face.

“I’m sorry, Y/N, did I hurt you?” his voice quiet, a note of rejection apparent in his voice, but you could feel the concern in his voice making you smile briefly, knowing that he would never hurt you or push you to do anything you didn’t want to do.

“No, no, Ben, I’m just confused. Earlier today, you said there was someone you wanted to marry… but had to wait for”, you said softly, keeping him close to you, your hand still in his hair.

Ben chuckled kindly, “I was on about you, little mouse”. It clicked then in your head, all the teasing and touching, you had thought it was all one sided and that he only saw you as his little sister or something.

Before you could even process what you were doing, you closed the gap between you, your hands going around his back of his neck so that you could bring his mouth closer to yours. Ben didn’t even hesitate as he brought you up to straddle his lap, hands running up and down your sides, as if he was committing your touch to memory.

Kissing him feverishly, you moved your hands back up into his hair, gripping the hair at the nape of his neck, making him moan harder into your mouth, sending a surge of warmth to your core. His teeth grazing your lower lip, you opened your mouth at the feeling, giving him access for his tongue to explore your mouth. You could still taste the remnants of the rum you had been drinking and it was intoxicating in more ways than one. He then moved from your mouth, kissing along your jaw down to your neck, finding a specific point that elicited a moan to escape from you. Ben growled into your neck at the sound, making him sound almost primal, and you could feel a definite warmth start to pool between your legs.

You tried to adjust yourself, not knowing what you needed but you knew you needed something, and you found yourself accidentally rubbing the inside of your thigh against something hard, making Ben grind out a string of curses in your ear. You stilled, you knew how sex worked, as you had listened to countless men down at the docks talk about it, but you had never considered what you would do if the situation presented itself to you.

Ben was lowering your back to the sand now, still kissing that spot on your neck that was still causing you to moan loudly; the both of you still fully clothed, he positioned himself between your legs and ran his hands from their tight grip on your thighs up to your arms, skimming your breasts on the way, causing you to press them into his chest. He growled again, pinning your arms above your head and moved his lips back to yours, him hovering over you so that he didn’t crush you underneath him, the both of you breathing heavily as your kisses became more intense. In a moment of euphoria at the feeling of him biting your lower lip, you let your hips meet his; causing his very prominent erection to skim your clothed centre, both cursing at the sensation. When you brought one of your legs to wrap around Ben’s hip in an attempt to repeat the same sensation, Ben brought one of his hands to your neck and gripped it softly, the other hand still keeping your arms raised above you on the ground.

Ben had moved away from your lips again, causing you to let out a little whine of annoyance, you felt his smirk on you as he left a trail of small but intense kisses from your jaw back to your neck, letting out a wanton moan again, causing Ben to unintentionally thrust ever so slightly into you again.

“Fuck, Ben”, you breathed, your cheeks reddened at the sound of your voice as you had never heard it so raspy, clearly Ben hadn’t either as he repeated the action to try and get you to do it again. His hand now leaving your throat as it travelled to your leg that was wrapped around him, holding it tighter to him whilst tightening his grip on your wrists. You let out a wince of pain as he went over your bruise that Hux made earlier, and he immediately removed himself from you, eyes wide in an unspoken apology.

“Y/N, I’m sorry! I never meant to go that far, I got carried away. Did I hurt you? I am so sorry, Y/N”, his voice still husky from your heated exchange. You sat up to meet him, holding his face in your hands, running your thumbs over his cheeks to soothe the concern that he still held in his eyes.

“You could never hurt me, Ben Solo”, you said, voice still low, and you placed a chaste kiss to his lips and then lent forward so that your foreheads were touching, Ben wrapping his long arms around you. Arms dropping to his chest, you had felt his chain under your hand and brought it to your fingers, playing with the smooth metal as you sat together on the sand, the beach around you now dark, spare for the fire that was burning softly a few meters away. You were both quiet for a while, relishing in each other’s warmth until Ben spoke again.

“I wasn’t going to push you, I just wanted you to know that. I never want you to feel uncomfortable around me, or feel like you don’t have a choice”, your heart warmed at his words, he knew how you felt about your home situation and so he didn’t want you to feel like that with him. You kissed him again and he kissed you back, not heated and as intense as before, but these kisses allowed you to convey to him how much you appreciated him.

You broke apart to bring your arm forward, rolling up your sleeve to show him the bruise that was formed there.

“Did I-”, you cut him off with a small shake of your head, readying yourself for his reaction to your next few words.

“Hux, earlier today”, you sighed.

You weren’t sure what to expect when you told Ben what had happened, but him gently grabbing your wrist to bring it to his lips and kiss it was not the first thing that would have come to mind.

“I am going to kill him”, the way his voice sounded calm and so full of resolution sent a shiver down your spine. You could tell he was promising more to himself than you, it made you feel the smallest bit of fear of the man in front of you, not scared of what he could do to you, but what he would do to others if they hurt you. 

“Promise you will take me with you when you go. Promise you won’t leave me here, please”, you had brought your hand up to play with his chain again, the two pendants reflecting in the firelight. You could feel Ben’s head drop to look at what you were doing and lifted his hands to his neck and took off his necklace, you looked at him, a brief face of confusion until he brought it forward to put it around your neck. The cool metal hitting your skin made you release a small gasp; you caught the brief smirk that flashed on Ben’s face.

He brought his lips to your forehead, kissing you softly you heard him whisper, “I Promise”.

* * *

A couple of weeks had passed since your night with Ben on the beach, and you were probably the happiest you could have ever been, even Hux couldn’t get under your skin as much, as just knowing how Ben felt about you now made your heart soar.

You were heading down to the blacksmith’s; back in your breeches and tunic, thankful to be out of the restricting dresses you had been shoved into over the week. You hadn’t been able to see Ben in the evenings for a couple of days, as you were forced to attend different events with Hux and your father, though you had seen him across the courtyard one day as he was carrying sacks of sand over his shoulders and you had given him a small wave and a smile, unable to see his response as you were hurried along by Hux.

Hux had seemed a lot more hands on in these weeks, touching you more and being a lot more present around you and he was being a lot smugger in general, which unsettled you a bit. He would keep you on his arm when at the events, rarely letting you leave his sight, and had picked up one or two times that he would call you his when you were introduced to new people at the events. You had done your duty to be cordial throughout the dinners, parties and ceremonies that you were dragged to. It unsettled you to learn of the conversations Hux and his men would discuss of you when they thought you were not listening, calling you fiery and that when the time came, you would sure make an interesting bed mate. You had to suppress the bile rising in your throat at the sound of their words, acting as if you were nothing but a piece of meat.

Though you were determined not to let it get to you and to focus your time tonight on Ben. Your relationship had not progressed past some heated petting, though you had noticed some more lingering hands when Ben would adjust your stances when sparring or when he would help you down from fixing the rigging. You knew he didn’t want to push you to do anything you didn’t want to do, but you had been wanting to take things further since that first kiss. Ben was always the one to stop kissing you first; saying how he wanted to make sure you were ready and that he didn’t want you to regret the decision. You admired his chivalry but damn you just wanted more.

You could tell that Ben was finding it more and more difficult to stop going any further than rough kisses and caresses, as the last time you saw him he had you pressed into one of the walls in the back room of the blacksmith’s, bringing your legs to cross at his back so he was fully supporting you. Biting and sucking on your neck that would elicit more moans the rougher he was, more than once you had heard him growl “mine” into your neck, which if you were standing on your legs, would have made you go weak at the knees. As soon as he would start to accidentally grind into you, he would stop, letting out a strained sigh as he carefully unwrapped himself from your legs, moving forward so he could kiss your forehead and take a few moments to calm himself down. After every time you would feel your desire for him build in you, and you were itching for release.

You had decided to convey this to him tonight, to take it a step further between the two of you, you weren’t sure about going all the way yet, but you wanted to see where things would naturally go if he didn’t restrain himself.

You rushed a bit more to get to the shop front, eager to spend more time with Ben, and before you knew it you were outside the shop front knocking on the door for Mr Jacobs to let you in. You waited a few moments before the old blacksmith answered.

“Miss L/N, what are you doing here?” the man’s voice was gruff, and you furrowed your brow at him.

“I’m meeting with Ben like normal, why?” something felt off to you, the old man would normally just give you a quick hello before letting you inside, you had been there often enough he knew you to just saunter in like you owned the place.

“He didn’t tell you”, he stated, annoyance clear in the way he spoke. The man before you rubbed his face, looking at the ground, “Y/N, he’s leaving.” Your body filled with ice.

“No, there has to be a mistake, he wouldn’t leave and not tell me. He promised to take me. No!” the look in the old man’s eyes told you that he wasn’t lying, and you could feel the hot tears already falling down your face. You turned on your heel and ran towards the docks, leaving the man behind you in the doorway, eyes following you as you ran.

You had never run so quickly before, your side was hurting but you pushed through it; tears still running down your cheeks as the sun was starting to set, hoping you hadn’t missed him. You arrived at the docks and looked around trying to see which ship was getting ready to leave, running down the deck you saw the crew to the supply ship start to onboard the cargo that was to be traded with the nearby islands.

You began to scream Ben’s name trying to find him, terrified that he had already gone, leaving you without an explanation. You weaved in and out of the people who were climbing aboard the ship, still shouting Ben’s name as you got onto the deck. A hand grabbed your arm, halting you where you stood, and spinning to face the person who grabbed you. Before you could begin to speak, you were being dragged back off the ship, and away from the crew so that you stood on the decking a few meters away so that you weren’t getting in the way.

“Ben, what’s going on? Mr Jacobs said you were leaving, what is happening?” you pulled your arm out of his grasp, wiping away the tears from your face, looking at him as he was hunched over slightly, not looking at you in the eye.

“I received a letter from my father, he has asked me to find him. So, I am leaving”, his voice was empty, and you looked at him, trying to see if he would look at you.

“I will come with you, we can find him together”, you started walking towards him, but he stepped back causing you to stop.

“No, Y/N, you have to stay here. Its where you belong”, he looked at you then, his face devoid of emotion.

“I belong with you, Ben. You promised to take me with you, you promised you wouldn’t leave me behind!” you wept, tears streaming again as he looked away from you.

“You say we belong together yet you still go round with the Commodore on your arm?” he took a breath , and you felt like he was pushing himself to say more, choosing how to hurt you, “you can’t even be seen with me unless you are pretending to be someone else”, his voice low and pained.

“You say you care for me , but you haven’t told your father how you feel, haven’t even tried to put a stop to Hux’s advances or his claim on you”, he continued, “how can you say we belong together when you act as if you are ashamed of me? I do not belong in your world, Y/N, you are off at events and dinner parties, showered in wealth and extravagance. And I’m nothing but a blacksmith, a little bit of excitement for you in your boring life”, he was seething at you now pain evident in his eyes, every word he said felt like a knife to your heart. You tried to reach for him, but he shook your hand away.

“Ben, you know that’s not true! Please! You know I can’t stay here!” you were full on sobbing at him now, and if you could see properly through the tears you would have seen the pain of how Ben’s words were effecting him too.

“You can’t rely on me for entertainment anymore, Miss L/N, I’m done being your play thing you can order around for your own amusement”, his voice was back to being empty, as if he had cut all the emotion from him.

“Ben, please! Don’t leave me! Don’t you dare leave me”, you were begging now, “I love you!” the words slipped from you before you could stop them, and you could tell that they had affected him, and a small part of you hoped that he would change his mind. It appeared as though it took every part of him to get the next words out, he stared at you then, looking as though he had put on a mask as he rid his face of emotion again.

“But I don’t love you, I never have”.

He turned from you then, and you were still begging him, your voice hoarse from crying, you were stood where he left you on the decking of the pier still crying as he walked away, never looking back once.


	3. Captors and Stolen Paintings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Four years had passed since Ben Solo had broken your heart.  
> You were beginning to believe that you would be stuck on Chandrila forever, living out the rest of your life on the island you now despised.  
> Though it seems as though the infamous Captain of the Finalizer has other plans...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello all!  
> Thank you soo soo much for your kind comments and Kudos ! It has really made my week ! And I love all of you ! 
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter touches on topics of suicidal thoughts, domestic abuse and alcoholism.  
> If this makes you uncomfortable then you can skip past to the first line break as its only touched on really in the first section.
> 
> Love you all and I hope you like this chapter!

“Y/N, are you ready?” the knock at your door and your fathers voice pulled you out of your daze. You took a deep breath, exhaling slowly to keep your emotions in control, you stood and walked over to the door, opening it to the sight of your father.

“Oh, Y/N, you look wonderful”, his soft smile trying to reassure you, “come on, we should get going, we don’t want to be late for the ceremony”.

You walked with your father, hand on his arm as you forced a smile on your face as he spoke, talking about what to expect from today, as if you hadn’t been to a hundred promotion ceremonies before.

You had been dreading today ever since the newly appointed ‘General Hux’ had arrived back from his six-month voyage. Knowing that every passing day brought you closer to your wedding. Hux had proposed before he left, saying that once he was made General the two of you would be wed. He was only supposed to be gone for three months, but they had a run in with some pirates who knocked them off course. You wanted to send them flowers.

You had heard from gossip that there was a specific pirate who had something against the First Order Trading Company, and that they were targeting the surrounding islands that belonged to the First Order. A man-of-war ship with black sails that patrolled the seas, taking out anyone who crossed them. Hux had even fuelled the flame, saying how he had met the Captain, a vicious man called Kylo Ren, and had given him a scar on his face as a reminder not to mess with the First Order. All the surrounding women had swooned at Hux’s ‘bravery’ for fighting with a mad pirate, you had accidentally let out an unflattering snort, knowing that the likelihood of Hux doing the dirty work himself was slim. You had gotten a beating for that.

For four years now you had put up with Hux’s ‘teachings’, as he liked to call them. Never to the face, he wouldn’t risk anybody catching on to how he tried to keep you in line. By now you were becoming numb to almost everything, feeling as though you were less than nothing, only a pretty face of high standing for Hux to parade around on his arm. At first you had tried to fight back by giving snarky remarks, as you knew yourself well enough that sometimes they happened of their own accord, but after a while even those stopped happening, knowing that if you stayed quiet, you wouldn’t get hurt as much. Raised voices always made you flinch, and it took everything in you to suppress them whilst in public, not wanting anyone to witness your panic attacks and for them to know how weak you felt.

Alcohol seemed to be the only thing that would help. You had a few bottles of rum stored away under the floorboards of your room, replacing them every few weeks. The nights where it would become too much to deal with you would numb yourself with a bottle, blocking out Hux’s hateful words and actions, you drank yourself into oblivion. On your darkest days; where you would be stuck inside your own head, repeating over and over how it was all your fault and how you deserved it and that if you had just “kept your pretty mouth shut”, then you wouldn’t be in this mess. On these days you had just wanted it all to end, for the pain that ran through you constantly to disappear, to be free of Hux’s hold on you. But you knew deep down you didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of knowing he broke you. So you would drink to forget, and it would work for a night, then when you woke you would remember it all and feel ashamed all over again. You had gotten fairly good at sobering yourself up in the mornings, not letting anyone know what state you were in the night before.

You were headed to the great hall that was situated along the shore front, giving a wonderful view of the horizon, the Supremacy in view, ready for the ceremonial dinner. Though it would remain docked, it was the closest to being out at sea for the first time in years, as Hux had instructed that you had armed men with you at all times, to follow you through town or positioned outside your bed chamber.

You entered the hall and found your seats, chatting idly with some of the other ladies in attendance, talking of the latest fashion from England and France that was being shipped over, one of the women commenting how scandalous the French seemed to be with their skirt lengths. You had to supress rolling your eyes. When they got onto the topic of you and the General you had to keep your smile as real as possible, answering their questions as though you were enamoured with him. Asking if you were proud of him, when that date was for the wedding, when you planned to have children of your own. An extremely small part of you was happy to see Hux when he dragged you away from the incessant questioning to join him on stage. Though this happiness was short lived. 

Once the ceremony was about to begin, Hux’s arm came around you, his fingers digging into your side as he whispered into your ear, “I want you on your best behaviour today, can you be a good girl for me?” you almost retched, his voice trying to be seductive but it just made you feel nauseous.

“Answer me”, he continued, digging his fingers further into your side which was starting to hurt you, “you know how much I hate giving you your lessons”.

“Yes, sir, I promise to be good”, voice empty as you stared ahead, not wanting to look at the smirk that was on his face.

“Good, as you will be required to visit my quarters on the Supremacy for a…” he pondered on the right words, though you knew exactly what he wanted, “… show”. He removed himself from you as the ceremony was about to start, leaving you behind him as he stood forward to accept his medals. You went rigid, knowing what kind of show you would be forced to perform in, they didn’t happen often, only when there was cause for a big celebration.

The rest of the evening passed as though you had left your body, hearing yourself have light-hearted conversations with the people around you, and doing your duty as the Governor’s daughter to socialise with everyone, to a good host. Since you had been raised to be a proper lady, you always said you could do all of it in your sleep, and now you really knew that you could. You were dreading going to Hux’s quarters, being locked in with the small group of higher ups as you ‘performed’ for them, Hux reminding you to do a decent job or they may have to get physical.

  
It was late by the time you got home, your hair ruffled from being pulled at, your dress torn in places, you were thankful they hadn’t been able to get through your corset. You walked up to your room, not even glancing at the guard who was stationed outside of it and closed the door. You let your tears fall then, never giving any of them the satisfaction of seeing you hurt, you went through the motions of getting ready for bed.

You opened your window, sitting on the bench built into it and basking in the moonlight. You reached for the necklace you had placed around your neck, the only time you would wear it was in the safety of your bedroom. Playing with the gold chain as you looked out, watching the water ripple against the shore in the distance.

You had come to learn a long time ago that no one was coming to save you, that unless you got out yourself, you would remain on Chandrila, and Hux was making that extremely difficult for you.

He had known all those years ago that you would sneak out at night to practise with swords and play sailor, and swiftly put a stop to it, you hadn’t picked up a sword since then and had only been allowed on ships for events or if he was present. You still knew the theory of how your two favourite activities worked, as you had made extensive notes whist you were still learning, and you would go over them almost every night, treating them as your mantra, forcing yourself to remain calm and focusing your mind on them if you began to feel overwhelmed, though you would normally resort to the bottle if it didn’t work.

The past two years had been hard on you, ever since you turned eighteen, Hux had been testing how far you could take his methods.

The performances were a recent development, having you dance around almost naked as Hux and his men watched, grabbing you and pulling you to sit in their laps, grinding their erections into you, trying to guide your hand to grasp hold of them while the others watched, stroking themselves as they did. Hux wouldn’t let you touch them though, being the selfish man he was, he wouldn’t let the others have their fill of you, which he told you, “You should be grateful I don’t take you right here for them all to see”, wanting to keep you ‘pure’ for your wedding night. Though he would happily threaten you into performing these ‘shows’, saying he would bring your sister in if you didn’t comply. And although the two of you didn’t always see eye to eye on everything, you would never subject her to this, you wouldn’t let her bear the burden and the pain you felt.

Catching your reflection in the window, you stared at yourself, your eyes going to the dark circles under your eyes; reminding you of the nightmares you faced each night, moving to the sallowness of your cheeks indicating that your loss of appetite was starting to affect you. 

You looked empty, a shell of the girl you once knew, who was strong and would spend her days laughing as though she had no care in the world, which you supposed you didn’t back then.

You knew what the First Order Trading Company really was now, and had done for a long time, colonisers who would steal land from those who it belonged to, forcing people into slavery to produce the goods that would be traded on to the surrounding islands and shipped back to England. Your family gaining from the hard, unfair work of others. It made you sick.

You had tried to bring up the harshness of it all during dinner one night, you had fought with both Hux and your father on it, the both of them saying that they were creating a new empire which advances us beyond others, whilst you argued why couldn’t they stay in Europe instead of taking away the land that wasn’t theirs. Your father and Hux had both insisted you knew nothing of the subject, being only a woman and not knowing the details of it all and how they were helping the indigenous people. You had stormed away that night, readying yourself to leave for good, before Hux’s men had dragged you back from the port. It was from then that you were not seen without some sort of guard.

Taking the chain in your hand you played with the two cubes that hung from it as you looked back out to the open sea. You tried not to think of Ben too much as you would find tears streaming down your face, though you never knew if it was due to anger or sadness at the loss of your best friend. It was on days like today when you would blame him for leaving, for breaking his promise and your heart.

Hux had taunted you with Ben’s betrayal for months, planting numerous thoughts in your head to why he had left, saying how Ben was using you until he found something better or for your family’s influence. “How could you think he could ever love someone like you? He was using you, you were no more than a whore to him”, you wanted to believe they weren’t true, but Hux had worn you down with these words repeatedly, and after Ben told you himself that he didn’t love you, you believed him.

That’s also when you found out that he knew of you sneaking out, not wanting to punish you for leaving, but to collect information to hurt you later, which he did successfully. There were days even now, four years on, that he would bring him up, saying how Ben was just the first man who would disappoint you. Hux would then go on to call you worthless, nothing more than his property and how he could do anything to you once you were married, and that no one would take you from him.

Hux had told you when he had got back from his voyage that he had heard word that Ben had died. He had said it so offhandedly during dinner one night with your family, you didn’t know how to react, Hux continuing saying that it seemed he turned into a petty thief and got himself killed for it. You had cried until you were sick that night, it brought up all your old feelings, not leaving your room for nearly a week.

Wiping the tears from your cheeks, you got up from your position on the bench and stretched out, moving towards the floorboards to try and force yourself to forget about tonight, and the pain of thinking about Ben. That was until you heard the land shaking boom of canon fire.  


* * *

  
  
More cannon fire sounded around you, twisting around to look out the window to see fires spread throughout the town, gasping at the sight as you saw the ship that had caused it to now be illuminated by the fires. It was clearly the Finalizer.

Still in your nightdress, you pulled on a robe before heading out of your room to find your father and sister. Not even noticing the lack of a guard outside of your door.

“Lizzie!” you called for your sister, entering her room to see it was empty you assumed she was already out looking for your father.

You could hear your father calling you, heart beating loudly in your chest, feeling the adrenaline pumping through your body as you ran down to meet him. The three of you running out of the door, only to sharply come to a stop at the sight of the two large men coming towards you, large cutlass’s in their hands and guns at their waist.

“We need to split up! Lizzie, take father and run, go now! I will meet with you later! Go!” urgently shoving your sister and father from you to get them moving quickly, they both ran. You waited a beat, hoping that the two men would follow you instead, and then ran as fast as you could, hiking up your skirts so that your legs weren’t as restricted.

You rounded a corner, catching your breath as you listened out for the mystery men.

“Are you sure she’s the one the Captain wants?” you heard one voice, closer than you realised.

“That was the Gov’ner right? Kylo said she was his daughter”, the second man spoke, both had followed you then. You had to quickly think back on how to attack without a weapon, readying yourself to fight and then run off again.

They turned the corner and you struck one of them in the stomach with your foot, kicking out and knocking them down, letting out an exasperated breath as you prepared for your next hit.

“Little Lady seems to be able to fight, eh?” the gruff man spoke, raising his cutlass higher.

“Screw you”, you bent your knees slightly, fists clenched as you swung at the large man, landing a punch right on his jaw. The man swayed slightly, dazed from your blow but it wasn’t hard enough to knock him down.

“Yeah, she’s definitely the one we want, grab her, Vic”, ‘Vic’ was the one you knocked down first, though you had not realised he had gotten back up whilst you were swinging at the other pirate.

He reached for you, trying to pick you up but you scampered out of his grip and began to take off towards the trees, hearing the two men follow behind you.

Your skirts caught on the trees, and you ripped them away before they could hold you back any further, them now coming above your knees, giving you more room to run.

“We can’t let her get away!” you heard them bellow, the closeness of them becoming apparent and you tried to get further away from them. You turned you head, trying to gauge where they were and what side they were coming from, realising your mistake when you fell over a tree root, barrelling to the ground with a thud, crying out in pain as you hit your head on the floor.

“Over there!” you heard the gruff voice as you staggered up, swaying as you held your aching head.

“F-Fuck you!” you curled your lip at your intended captors, attempting to raise your fists at them again, wincing as you did so. 

“Give it up, girly, you’re coming with us whether you like it or not”.

“Bite me”, you threw a punch, but one of the two men grabbed your arm and flipped you over his shoulder, carrying you down towards their ship.

“Buckle up, sweetheart, you’re going to help us take down the First Order”, both men were laughing now, and you could feel the edges of your vision go black and before you could retort, you were unconscious.  


* * *

You were in and out of it as you were taken aboard the ship. Still slung over one of the pirates shoulders, you heard a babble of voices around you; orders to set sail, to store away the looted items, most of the voices you couldn’t distinguish until you heard a low voice come over to you and your captors.

“Your orders were to collect the girl, you weren’t supposed to harm her,” the voice said menacingly.

“She fell, Captain, we think she hit her head”, you couldn’t tell which of the two had spoken and you still couldn’t open your eyes. 

The feeling of unconsciousness starting to drift back in, but before you could succumb to it you heard the Captain speak again.

“Take her to my quarters, no one is to enter whilst she is in there, and make sure you arm every man on this ship”.

The next time you awoke you could at least open your eyes. Your head was hurting, feeling it pulsate in time with your heartbeat as you raised yourself up, shielding your eyes as the morning light come in through the windows, illuminating the room around you.

“Fuck”, wincing as you steadied yourself on the mattress, your body swaying. Feeling the bed beneath you, you realised you were not in your chambers, you had hoped that it was in fact all a dream, that you had blacked out from alcohol and imagined it all.

The black silk sheets that you lay upon, adorned the large bed, your bare legs feeling how soft it was, though thinking that it wouldn’t do much in keeping you warm. From what you could see of the rest of the room, it was all donned in black, yet it gave off a familiar warmth.

Scanning the room, your eyes caught on a large painting above the desk to the right of the bed, it seemed to be the only painting in the room. Rubbing your eyes as they adjusted to the light, you stared at it, recognising it to be the same painting that your father had gifted Hux as an engagement gift, to take with him as he set off on his voyage to England.

You knew it was the same one, you had sat for it for long enough. Positioned on the balcony outside your father’s office, one hand resting on the wall the other touching your necklace. Gazing out longingly at the ocean that was set as your backdrop, the three ships in the distance; the Supremacy, the Mandator, and another ship that was too far away to recognise.

You were placed in a black, sleeveless gown, made of fitted velvet that hugged all of your curves. Matching fabric draped from your hips and was fastened in place with a large gold buckle, the train flowing out a few meters behind you. Your hair was up, placed in a bun on the crown of your head. The only jewellery you wore was the necklace that Ben gave you, the painter insisted on you wearing it as he laid out your outfit, saying it was unique and how it complemented the dress.

You had thought that the painter had made you seem sad, judging by the look on your face. He said you looked like a pained lover who was waiting for her one love to return home to you from sea, you didn’t know where he got that idea from as you were clearly not thinking of Hux.

You couldn’t understand why the painting was here in what you presumed to be the captain’s quarters. You supposed that during the raid that has delayed Hux, the First Order had been looted, though that still didn’t explain why it was in this cabin.

Wanting to get a better look at it, you moved your legs to the side of the bed. You almost buckled, gripping the sheets behind you to stop yourself from falling.

Everything ached. Knowing that you had probably overexerted yourself when you ran from the two pirates, as you hadn’t worked out like that in years, you were surprised you did as well as you did, your body probably relying on adrenaline.

A chuckle in the far corner of the room got your attention.

“My apologies for startling you, please you need to rest, you hit your head pretty hard,” a low, smoky voice called out to you, “I see you were admiring my painting. It’s quite lovely isn’t it?” the voice continued. Locating the speaker in a darkened corner, you couldn’t make out their face as they had pulled their hat low, you could only see that they were sat in a large chair, one leg crossed over the other knee.

“Who’s there?” you still hadn’t moved, “why am I here? Why do you have my painting?”.

“You’re my guest”, you could hear the smirk, “I am Kylo Ren, Captain of this ship”.

“I know you, _Pirate_ ”, you spat the last word, still clutching onto the bed as your legs were screaming in agony.

Another chuckle. “You do? I must say I’m flattered. To have gained the attention of such a beautiful woman, it’s what most men crave, no?”, flushing at his complements you watched him walk over to the desk, though you could only see his back.

“You haven’t answered my questions” you kept your eyes on his tall frame, watching out for any sudden movements.

“My men were impressed by the way you handled yourself, though I doubt that they would admit that to you, it’s not often they get knocked down. It’s even rarer for them to be knocked down by a woman, though I can imagine you are not like most women, I would be delighted to see what other talents you may possess”, he was actively avoiding your questions, flirting with you to keep you off topic. There was something about him that captivated you, and you tried to shake your head to rid you of the trance he had put you in. Needless to say it wasn’t working.

“You really should rest on the bed, I can only imagine how tired you must be”, voice silky as he turned to face you, perching on the desk, hands bracing the sides. His hat still low, covering the majority of his face.

Before your legs gave out fully, you climbed back onto the bed, the way he spoke was mesmerising to listen to, and you felt yourself wanting to please the man before you. You frowned, there was something not quite right, you felt as though you were being lured into a false sense of security.

Kylo smiled approvingly.

“Good girl”, swallowing hard, you felt something within you stir at his words. You were used to receiving the same words from Hux, but the way Kylo Ren said them took you back to a time of heated kisses and being held up against walls.

“There is an armoire in the corner if you want to change into something more comfortable once you’ve had the chance to rest, I can imagine a tattered night dress isn’t what you would like to continue to wear on my ship”, feeling his eyes on you, you looked down at your attire. Dress torn and dirtied, it was now coming to your mid-thigh and you tried to pull it down as far as you could; so as to not accidentally flash the Captain, catching him smirk at you from under his hat as you did.

“Although, if you would prefer to sleep bare, then know that is perfectly fine whilst you stay in my quarters” he said, his flirting tone making you look away from him, shifting under his gaze.

“You still haven’t answered my questions”, you persisted.

“But they are such boring questions to ask,” sighing before he continued, “fine, if you insist on it, I will answer your questions, though you may not like the answers”, Kylo said, still perched on his desk.

“I stole the painting from your darling fiancé. A warning that I can take whatever I want from him. The painting was worth it for the scar I received, as I must say, you look delectable in black,” you felt your face flush, but held your gaze as you gave him a look to continue. You heard him sigh in annoyance.

“You are here because you _are_ the fiancé to the General of the First Order Trading company, and I need you here so that we can lure the Navy out so that their greater defences are weakened. Hux knows he needs to see you returned to safety given your staus as the Governor’s daughter, and he knows I have you, meaning he will come out himself to get you.

"The First Order are thieves who profit off of those who are too weak to rise against them, turning them into slaves so that they can take their land. Once I destroy them, you can leave, until then though, you will stay in this room”, his voice had lost all of the playfulness he previously had, you could tell his temper was rising.

“So let me get this straight-“ you could feel yourself getting angry, “- you want to use me as bait so that The First Order will come after me? You want to trap me in this room, and you assume I am going to help you? I won’t do it, take me back to shore”.

“You want to run back to Chandrila? You know what the First Order is doing, you can’t be that dense to see it. I thought you might understand, that you might be sympathetic to our cause, guess I was wrong”, his condescending tone made you bare your teeth.

“I don’t want to be anywhere near Chandrila! Of course I know what they are doing, I’m the only one on that God forsaken island who sees the First Order for what they are! I just don’t want to be used as a pawn for anyone’s gain. I’m sick of arseholes like you who think they can control me. Take me to shore”, seething at the man through gritted teeth.

“I don’t take orders from the likes of you,” it was his turn to snarl now, and the fear that was lurking in the background was very apparent now, “sitting there on your high horse thinking your better than the rest of us, we’re all pawns in this game. Sorry to break it to you, sweetheart, but whether you like it or not, you and I are the same, we get treated like dirt until we become useful for something”. You flinched at his harsh words, as though he knew you personally, attacking you where it would hurt most.

“You know nothing about- “

“I know more than you could ever imagine”, he interrupted you, “so alone, so desperate to leave your little bubble, but afraid to do so in case all you’ve ever wanted ended up disappointing you. Longing for a life at sea; leaving your family behind, they never understood how you felt, never understood that you could never fit into their ways of life. How would your dear fiancé react, hmm? If he only knew his beloved wanted to leave him-“

“Shut. Up!” you had gripped the sheets raising yourself to seem more of a threat.

“You’re only angry because I’m right”.

“You can’t possibly know what I’ve been through!” shouting at him as he was walking towards you now, and you felt yourself retreat towards the headboard. He grabbed your arm, stopping you from retreating further, his large hand circling your wrist as he pulled you towards him.

You saw a hand go upwards, and out of instinct you flinched away to cover your face with your other arm, lips trembling as you squeezed your eyes shut, waiting for the blow to come.

After a few moments you opened your eyes, as no impact had come down on you. Furrowing your brow in confusion, you had thought that he would have definitely struck you for the way you had been speaking, you looked towards him.

He had been reaching up to pull off his hat, showing you his face. A long, thin, pink, jagged scar that ran from his brow, down into the depths of his shirt. Black shoulder length hair, decorated with beads and threads, kept back from his face with a dark red headscarf.

His expression was one of deep sorrow as he had watched you flinch away in fear, you could see in his eyes that he knew you had been in that situation a few times.

He dropped his hat as he brought his hand up to your face, you flinched away again before you could feel his warm thumb wiping away the tears that had formed.

“Oh, little mouse,” the familiar nickname clenching at your heart, “it seems I don’t know what you have truly been through”, his voice small as he stroked the side of your face, gently pulling the arm that he had gripped and holding it into his chest, bringing the two of you closer.

You looked up at him then, tears running freely as you looked into the eyes of the man you thought was dead.

“Ben”.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a shorter chapter than the last 2 but I hope you like it ! Let me know what you think in the comments ! 
> 
> Please note that the actions displayed in this fic should not be accepted in your real relationships, if you need to reach out against domestic abuse or substance abuse please feel free to message me, I am always available.
> 
> You can also contact these numbers:   
> Domestic Abuse hotlines:  
> UK: 0808 2000 247  
> USA: 512-453-8117
> 
> Substance abuse:  
> UK: 0300 0123 66 00  
> USA: 1-800-662-4357


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